Kabooom!!

Hi Guys, Just thought I'd share what can happen when you use no name aftermarket parts.

This happened a few months ago and has since been sorted. I was coming of the highyway from about 120km/h one evening and while slowing down on the offramp the car suddenly stuttered badly and but then normalized.  "That's strange" I remember thinking to myself with the sound of my girlfriend yapping in my ear in the background ever since we left my mom's place 20 mins earlier.  Came to a stand still at the robot and after it turned green, pulled away and turned right.  With Michelle still chewing my ear off about something I had said almost half an hour earlier and me being deep in thought wondering what caused the horrible stutter I was soon to find out what driving over a landmine felt like.  Few meters down the road on the bridge over the highway the car started stuttering again and for some unknown reason my patience instantly dissapeard. I stepped on the throttle to get it to rev up a bit and well I guess it revved up too high.

What followed was a bang so loud i almost sh*t my pants.  Even Michelle was quiet and that rarely happens.  For a split second I thought I saw the front end of my mark one picking up slightly and for a brief second I experienced what I can only imagine it feels like driving over a poorly made IED. Needless to say the car instantly died and with it still being in gear came to a crunching halt few meteres further on.  As we got out of the car I could smell the disgusting smell of hot gear oil and looking back I could see where it was coming from.  Spilled oil was running down from a few meters away all the way to underneath my car.  I started walking back finding and picking up hot pieces of "bomb schrapnell" that I later learned was once the car's flywheel.  After collecting all the pieces and dumping them in my boot I realized I am going to need a tow.  I contacted a friend and while waiting for him to arrive took the following pictures that will tell the the rest of the story. (Hopefully they are showing as I am adding them as attachments)

Wow that must of been a good bang, what caused it !

F me. That is pretty cool really. Glad you are all ok and hope it does not hurt the piggy bank too much.

I have seen a con rod through the side of a block before but not an exploded fly wheel. I guess you will never know the cause for self distraction to coming loose or over tightened stress. Either way not some thing you see often (thank god).

Overall an extreme way to shut the missus up but seemed to work a treat. Now where are my car keys


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Oops.

Like your description of the traffic light as a 'robot' took me a minute to get that one  

Ian

Ha ha ha,

Yeah, like everything else in this backwards country we call traffic lights "robots'… kinda funny the more one thinks about it, As for what caused it, initially the car came with a 1.3ltr engine and had the smaller spec flywheel and because I was worried about clutch issues (clutch slipping etc) when fitting the 2ltr long block motor i opted for the larger one from a local autoparts store specialising in VW spares. The theory was that the larger surface area would solve clutch slipping, heating and a few other issues but in hindsight it was a pretty stupid idea as the clutch plate's outdiameter was still the same, anyway, the old hardware would've coped fine with the power of the 2ltr motor. I think this upgraded aftermarket flywheel had existing stress fractures or could possibly have been caused by myself and it was aggrevated by the constant max RPM pulls, together with the many many times it was removed and replaced trying to address a crank oil seal problem.

As for shutting up the missus, it sure worked but I could've thought of cheaper ways to achieve that.A new clutch kit, 2nd hand box and a new starter and its been running pretty well.  I bought a 288 106lsu camshaft for it and will fit that in the next month or two and will do a piece on that under general.

Hope you guys enjoyed enjoyed the story.

Cheers

 

Funny, as a similar thing just happened to my brother.

Loud bang, shutter at speed, he limped it home to find out that his Torque convertor(automatic) screw back out causing the TC to Wobble on the flexplate, and the flex snapped, Punched a hole in the Bell housing while doing a wee bit of driving….

He said how it didn't pierce the body I don't know.
(89 Brookwood Corvette).  

Sho!!!

He's lucky yes.  With the forch the flywheel that broke through the bellhousing on mine pieces of it bent my steering rack, bent the part holding the gear linkages on the steering rack, dented my new 4 - 1 branch and kinked my o2 sensor.

All through to the back of the car underneath are little dings and nicks where pieces of metal had flown through and made contact.  Not something nice to experience.

Cheers.

Lucky you weren't in a RWD car or it could have joined you in the Cabin!